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'In-depth' research on rhinos

Bringing rhino feces into the country from abroad is no easy task. For Queen’s University biologist Peter de Groot, it’s an easy pill to swallow for the love of his research.

De Groot is one of the researchers at Queen’s who was called by officials after a rare one-horned Javan rhinoceros was found dead in a Vietnamese game preserve.

His research regarding rhinoceros has spanned over eight years, focusing on the Javan rhino for the last three. The non-invasive testing methods utilized require rhino feces to be flown in to estimate the number of remaining animals in the area and how to best manage them. Previously conservation methods included habitat protection and camera tracking.

“At times it’s been incredibly frustrating to get the feces samples into Canada as it’s very difficult to get them into the country. Obviously they contain bacteria and viruses that we don’t necessarily want in Canada,” he said.

Officials from the World Wildlife Fund (WWF) in Vietnam had been mailing samples from the area, with the assistance of special dung detection dogs, to de Groot and his colleague at the molecular ecology laboratory.

“For us the work is doing mostly genetics, but for the WWF and the Asians, they’ve been working on this for 10 to 12 years and they’re the ones doing the fieldwork. So it’s been a massive investment on their end,” he said.

Genetic tools developed at Queen’s and Cornell University have allowed de Groot to determine there was only one living rhino in 2009, in Vietnam. The next year the rhinoceros was found dead. The species no longer existed in the country.,

De Groot uses techniques such as microsatellite DNA on samples of tissue and feces in order to determine individual animals and learn about breeding and movement habits.

“Handlers like Sarah Brooks did most of the work. We’re just the cherry on top,” he said.

However, due to the rarity of the Javan rhino, it’s a challenge to find fresh tissue samples for optimization of molecular markers, many of which comes from carcasses of poached animals who’ve had their horns removed. Currently, he estimates that there are approximately 38 Javan rhinos left in Indonesia.

Although he has never seen the Javan rhinos in person and has seen other rhinos in zoos, his interest in the project was accredited to the use of non-invasive methods to monitor.

“The usual way is to use trigger cameras, but it’s difficult to monitor individual ones through photographs. Now we’re able to use intestinal DNA to categorize it,” he said.

It also helps that Queen’s has one of the leading departments in the world in rhinoceros genetics.

“I would say that I’m fascinated with rhinos because they are prehistoric-looking animals that posses a virtual and commercial attachment to the world. We’ve got these huge tanks of beasts and they shouldn’t exist anymore but they do, so what can we do to protect them?” he said.

Moving forward, de Groot said the next stop in ensuring conservation is to identify the number of rhinos left in Indonesia and potentially moving some to another area.

“Having all of the world’s population in one area can be dangerous, as they may get diseases and it may spread,” he said.

However this could require catching and tranquilizing rhinos.

“On an individual basis I’m not too sure (if it would work) as you could lose a few and that would be terrible.”